


Transformation

by hawkstout



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Nightwing (Comics)
Genre: Dick grows wings, M/M, Pain, Shorts, Transformation, Wings, painful transformation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-19
Updated: 2014-01-19
Packaged: 2018-01-09 06:34:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,869
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1142668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hawkstout/pseuds/hawkstout
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At thirteen-years-old Dick Grayson grew a pair of beautiful black and blue wings.</p>
<p>In this story: Dick grows a pair of wings, suffering through a painful transformation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Transformation

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rubitan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rubitan/gifts).



> This is a short but I’m thinking I might make it into a series of stand alone shorts.
> 
> For Rubitan who’s always accidentally distracting me. <33 Ilu.

His back was being torn apart.

The thirteen-year-old curled up on the floor with his head down. He could feel them moving under his shirt. His bones were bending and shifting and then slowly stabbing out through his muscles and skin. He reached back feeling the sharp bloody bone sticking out. He felt his stomach churn, the strong urge to throw-up from the pain rose. He crawled toward the table where his phone was, but he couldn’t reach it before another wave of even more terrible agony flooded him. He screamed, crying into the floor. His shirt had been torn by the bones and it was too painful to try and pull it off now. 

He crawled forward again, but it was too much. He curled up in the fetal position. It was torture and he was sure his body couldn’t withstand the pain for much longer. He was freezing cold except his head and his shoulders which were wire hot. 

He sobbed until he fell into unconsciousness with the certainty that he was about to die. 

-

He woke up to pain, but not half as excruciating as before. He was placed on his stomach on his bed. He felt dizzy with fever.

A cool hand landed gently on his head, running through his sweaty hair. 

“It’s okay, I’m here,” Bruce’s low gravelly voice. 

“B-Bruce?” he breathed in between the pain. “What’s hap-happening?” He shut his eyes tightly trying his best not to move his shoulders suddenly, trying to ride the wave of dull pain and not let it bloom into the torture he felt before.

“Your bones are reshaping themselves and growing. I know it’s painful, but I can’t give you anything to stop the pain until we’re done with the tests. Human medicine might interfere with the process. We’re keeping the wound clean; making sure it won’t get infected. You just have to hold on and be strong.”

“I think I’m dying,” the thirteen-year-old gasped. His body shook from cold and the wound blossomed with new pain.

“I’m not going to let you die,” Bruce said firmly, his hand continuing to run through his hair. He felt better, safer with Bruce by his side. Bruce wouldn’t let him die. He felt like he could never die like this if Bruce was watching over him. 

His head spun and he bit hard on his lip. He felt it, another wave. He could hear the snapping of bone and feel his muscles tearing to let it through. He screamed. Bruce grabbed his hand and he squeezed tightly, muttering encouragements that Dick couldn’t understand. 

His insides started to burn. 

-

The next time he woke up he was still on his stomach, but the pain was nothing but a dull soreness now. There was a heavy weight on his back. He was exhausted, but it felt too wonderful for the pain to be gone. He tried to push himself up, but he ended up falling back face first on the bed. He felt sluggish and uncoordinated. 

“We figured out what would be safe to give you, Master Richard,” Alfred. Dick, with effort, turned his head. The old man was sitting in a chair with a thick book in his hands. If he thought hard about it Dick could remember Alfred’s voice mimicking different characters through the dizzying pain. The butler took his hand and squeezed. There was a relieved look in his eyes. 

“You’ve been in and out of consciousness for the past four day with heavy doses of painkillers.” 

Dick nodded tiredly.

“What happened?” He tried to remember anything Bruce and Alfred had said to him over the past four days, but it was mostly a blur. “Was it a hallucination?”

Alfred looked guilty for a moment. “I’m afraid not.” He let go of Dick’s hand and stood up. He pulled over a full length mirror. 

Dick gave a yell of disbelief. 

Out of his shoulders were… ugly looking lengths of stretched out skin over bones. Blood vessels spider-webbed across. He felt himself panic and he couldn’t breathe for a moment. 

“What is it?” He forced out trying not to choke. In his agitation the unnatural lumps of flesh trembled and he gave a shout of pain when he accidentally moved them. 

“Wings,” Bruce said from the door. He had an unreadable look on his face. Dick shuddered, unsure what to do.

“Why—why do I have wings?” Dick demanded. He expected Bruce to know the answer. Bruce knew everything when it counted.

Bruce only shook his head. 

“I don’t know, we’ve scanned your body, but there’s no foreign material… I was hoping you might be able to tell me to be honest.” 

Dick shook his head trying to hold tears back. He hated having no control of his body. He could feel it now. The weight of it, the new nerve endings growing, an awful itchiness. 

“I don’t know! Why would I know?” 

“It might be genetic.” 

Dick was glad and frustrated how calmly Bruce was telling him this. Genetic? So he was growing wings on purpose? 

“Tell me… tell me what you figured out,” He decided. He would rather know than not know.

“So far your shoulder blades and spinal cord have morphed to accommodate the wings. As well… the marrow of your bones is getting thinner and thinner. By the end of the week your bones will probably be hollow. Your skeleton will harden, but… it will make you lighter. You’ve lost weight as well. We can… theorize that this won’t kill you, because it’s in your DNA, this is supposed to be happening. Feathers are growing, you might feel itchy. In two weeks… you should have fully formed wings and… you might be able to use them as they were intended.” 

Dick felt freezing cold again. Shock. Was he slipping into shock? 

“We’ll figure it out, Dick.” Bruce’s voice was getting far away and he was shaking uncontrollably. The pain in his wings was far away and dull.

His wings. His _wings_. 

-

Dick stood in front of the mirror. His eyes were dull and there were black circles under them. It was the middle of the night, two weeks later. Dick moved silently. He needed to see. 

It was him. Him, plus two black wings bent over his shoulder. He tentatively tried to move them. They were stiff and sore, but he felt a weird drop in his stomach as they moved like any other limb on his body. They stretched out to their full span, and Dick could just make out lighter coloured blue feathers in the dim light of the reading lamp Alfred had left on. 

He quickly brought the wings back into a fold, too frightened to look at them for long. He felt so light. He was already small for his age, but his body felt like it could be thrown back by a strong gust of wind. 

He always had wanted to fly, but he had never wanted this. What was this? What was he? Would the rest of him change? Would he become a bird? He bit his knuckles forcing himself to hold it all in. He couldn’t freak out. If he panicked now, he would run to the kitchen and find the sharpest knife he could to cut the damn things off. 

He breathed slowly in through his nose and out through his mouth counting off the exhales. 

A cool calmness spread over him. He snuck out of his room and went to the kitchen, pulling out one of the medical kits. He pulled out bandages and folded his wings against his back as tightly as he could, then started wrapping the bandages around. It was hard and swore and awkward, but he finally finished. 

He pulled a shirt he had brought with him over his body. It was tight, but it fit. There were lumps from the wings, but a proper coat would cover them. 

He needed answers.

-

Years later Dick still thought back on that night as one of the worst he had ever experienced. Even worse than the pain was the lies the circus had spun around him. 

An egg that hatched a baby. His mother had been terrified when it had come out five months into her pregnancy. Mom and Dad protected him when the circus lost hope that he would grow wings like they had expected him to. It was in Dad’s blood. The “Gray Sons of Gotham.” 

And owls. Something about owls. 

Dick shivered. He didn’t learn anything more than that before Bruce came and dragged him home. He was glad Bruce did. He would have done something he regretted, but at the same time—

The next morning, before Bruce and he headed back for more answers, the circus had been burnt down. Pop Haly died in the fire and with him any information Dick might have learned about his… species. 

He could only wonder if it had something to do with him. 

“You’re brooding, Bluebird,” Jason came from behind and leaned over his wings to kiss his collar bone. 

“Are you implying I’m becoming Bruce?”

“You said it, not me,” Jason snickered. 

Dick’s wings gave a small flutter of good-natured annoyance. 

“Help me wrap them?”

He felt Jason’s hand slide down his right wing against his thick black and blue feathers. 

“It always seems like such a shame.” Jason’s voice was right near his ear. “They’re beautiful.” 

“They’re annoying. I can do it myself if you won’t.”

“Nah, I got it, I got it.” 

Binding his wings was always painful. The first time he had done it there was so much adrenaline and shock and pain meds that he hadn’t felt it, but wrapping them hurt. 

Jason was always gentle though. He pushed and folded. His fingers gently stroked the soft feathers and he moved the compressor around and then bound it with bandages. 

“Is it too tight?”

“No,” Dick shook his head. It always hurt. There was no getting around it. Jason kissed his shoulder again and handed him a shirt. He slipped it on. In the summer he took to wearing backpacks so the odd shape of folded wings wouldn’t draw any attention, but right now it was autumn. Dick grabbed a hooded sweatshirt and zipped it on. He looked at himself in a mirror. He seemed like any other normal human.  
That was important. There were people out there that would pay to have a creature like him. He seethed quickly with resentment. That he had to hide himself at all. 

The only time he used his wings was when he flew across the city as Nightwing. He had found freedom and joy from that, but he still felt chained to the mystery of his circumstances. 

“You really are brooding,” Jason grumbled, “You haven’t been listening to a word I’ve said.”

“Sorry,” Dick forced a smile. Anniversaries were like that. 

“It’s cool,” Jason squeezed his arm. “I was saying naughty things anyway.” 

Dick gave a started laugh of surprise, “Were you? And I missed it?”

“Very dirty,” Jason said smugly. 

Dick chuckled pulling on a thicker coat. He turned and pressed his lips against Jason’s. 

“I’ll see you tonight.”


End file.
